No Stupid Questions

Starting my life from scratch in late twenties again. Learned 99% about life in the past couple of solitary nothing-to-do years, or I'll just say, my thinking/ doing has changed completely. Now, I'm having a hard time relating to things other people relate to. Spending a lot of time alone surely is life changing. When you start to believe in nothing, you have a hard time dealing with people.

Don't compare yourself to other people. Compare yourself to who you were yesterday.

Do you have a goal? Set realistic achievable milestones. Come up with a 5 year plan of how you're going to get where you want to be.

Being a kind, generous person, being a good, supportive friend, such things matter so much more than having a startup or some patent. There are plenty of people who have "success" in the latter sense (often because they are good at bullshitting, boasting, marketing) but are - overall - a drain on society and their surroundings in terms of the first.

I’ve felt that way a lot in my life. I dropped out of college and lived essentially in my parents basement until my mid 20s. Turns out I had a bad case of undiagnosed depression and ADHD. I kinda naturally worked my way out of the depression mostly. I’ve fallen back in a few times. And that entire time I could think about anything but how little I’ve done with my life. How boring I must sound talking to anyone because I have zero experiences. But about 8 years ago, I got diagnosed and medicated.

I’m just some average guy, now with 2 kids and a wife, and I work 55 hours a week. It took a lot of work and finding good medications for me, but I’m honestly the happiest I’ve ever been. And I recently noticed I don’t dwell on comparing myself to others anymore and it’s been freeing. I don’t need to be distinguished for anything more than being a good father, husband, and human. And that’s enough for me.

Its time for me to read desiderata again.

i am going to tell you some universal truths.

1. first truth: you will not fully understand these truths. though i list them here clearly, you will still learn them the hard way.

2. do not compare yourself to others. regardless of how you measure their success, you will find only a brief moment of satisfaction upon outdoing them, followed swiftly by regret, insecurity, and, not long after that, emotional crisis.

3. financial and professional success are antithetical to happiness and fulfillment at least as often as they aren't.

4. you can only ever know yourself. everyone's life is a series of choices. only you can know what choices are the right ones for you. you cannot know anyone else's choices. you cannot know if anyone else is making the right or wrong choices. you cannot know what motivates others. your dataset for anyone else is so incomplete as to prevent the drawing of any good conclusions. no good reason to compare yourself to anyone. but when you do, there's no good reason to feel bad about it, or good about it, and certainly no good reason to feel bad instead of good.

5. what follows is a cliche, but it is not a cliche: your life begins now, and now, and now. you can only do something now. not back then and not in a bit. now. really understand this. if you're not happy now, it's because you keep doing things that make you unhappy. now, if you're not happy now, it's because you're still not doing anything to make yourself happy. what are you doing to make yourself unhappy?

6. you're making yourself unhappy. it's not them making you unhappy. they might be doing things you're not happy with, but you're the one doing unhappiness. now, if you want to bank all your happiness and fulfillment on outdoing these people, that's fine, but it's going to be awhile. years, decades, you're entire life, perhaps. but, don't forget number 2: happiness can't be found on this route. i wonder what it would look like, what choices you'd have to make, to be happy, and much sooner?

let me know how it goes. also, apologies for the length. it's all stream of consciousness and i'm to lazy to edit.

homework: read The Tao of Pooh

❤️

I like to focus on the little things rather than the big achievements. The big things are fun for strangers and the gram, but my family and friends care more about my homemade lasagna, the cool things I knit and the hugs and advice I give them when they're going through it. I press myself to achieve, but I doubt I'll ever get my own wiki page or anything.

Most people feel like this, in my experience. People usually don't feel totally satisfied with their accomplishments, but will assume everyone else is very satisfied with theirs. In reality, most people feel neutral about their situation 99% of the time, no matter how good it is. Past a certain point, when you've accommodated all your lower-level needs like food and safety, the only way to get legitimately happier is to count your blessings and be thankful for what you have, instead of chasing something you perceive as "better". Those things almost never actually make you happier, especially if they're materialistic.

Most people also show to others a fake version of themselves that has basically no problems in life. It's important to remember that what you see isn't usually what you get with most people. There are some who present themselves as being extremely happy but are severely depressed. It's important not to compare your genuine self to people's front-facing personas.

Only 99%?

Comparison is the thief of joy.

I get that all the time.

Graduated with a History degree ten years ago, spent 18 months afterwards unemployed because my degree closed many more doors than it opened, spent another 3 years working in dead-end customer service roles then worked my way up into a finance career. Last week I got my 'big break' where I managed to avoid redundancy and secure a financial reporting role that's relevant to my ACCA studies. This is one of those rare times where the stars aligned.

My love life (or lack thereof) is my biggest grievance with life. People my age are married/cohabiting and have children of their own, meanwhile I am turning 32 in the next two months and still haven't even lost my virginity because from my experience, women have often been very frigid and judgmental.

You're a good candidate for taoist philosophy. While I'm not sure what having absolutely no long term goals really feels like, I've had them my whole life, I can tell you that people have their own paths, and its in this diversity of paths that one of our strengths as a species lies. This is why authoritarians suck on the modern battlefield--too much conformity, leaves them inflexible. We allow diversity of thought and encourage initiative and independent action, in our militaries.

I don't think you should look to other people's accomplishments if accomplishing those things was never your goal in the first place, though. Was your goal, perhaps, learning? If so, those folks usually wind up with an eventual responsibility of handing their knowledge down to future generations, once it is accumulated sufficiently. I don't see how that contribution is worth any less than a start-up though.

For me? That seems low to be honest.

1. don't compare your life to other peoples. Everyone has their own path to follow. Some people are simply more motivated than others, and that's okay. As soon as I accepted I wasn't a money hungry ladder climber and just wanted peaceful stress free life carved on my own terms my goals were much more clear.

2. figure out what you really want. A person is like a ship at sea, it must have a destination, something to work towards, otherwise it floats adrift aimlessly. Picture what you want in your mind and want it so bad that you have to have it. If you don't know what it is, think harder and dream in your minds eye until a picture arises.

To answer the topic question, no I don’t, and its not a good thing. I’ve pushed it too hard for too many years and now my mind and body are suffering from that toll. And it wasn’t worth it.

My advice is take up a few hobbies, and enjoy life. Don’t bother chasing others or “Keeping up with the Jones.” Enjoy existing, because it is short.